… then every evening ended with Nigel. This towering man was our company every evening at the resort bar – where we caught up with our night caps and sometimes dinner too!! Last evening, we got to know about his life story. It is always a humbling experience getting to know the real people. Everybody has a story I can learn so much from…
But stay here for how nice the people are. Every single person in this island is very friendly. You may remember Richard, Shirley and Shelly from previous posts. On Sunday, the cigar-toting Edgar at the Liquor store and Alicia from the grocery store helped me fix a problem. (I was potentially running low on cash and both the ATMs in the island were not working!!).
In the resort itself, the people are even nicer, if that is even possible. Florence – the lady from Haiti who has been cleaning our room has been super nice. She told us her story from Haiti.
Nothing can start your day as well as a good breakfast by the turquoise blue waters and great conversations with Torez and Trisha. Both of them have young kids – almost a year and a half old. In fact, I got to meet Torez’s daughter – who was super friendly – in keeping with the island ethos, I guess. She saw me and immediately gave me a fist bump!!
“So, we come here for vacation. You live here. Where do you go for vacation?”
“Florida!”
“Really? What is there that you do not have here?”
“Tall buildings!” said Torez
“Tall buildings?”
“Yes, I can look up. Here you cannot look up!”
“That is funny”
Trisha added – “You come here to see what you do not have. We go there to see what we do not have!”
Sounds about fair!!
** all names are cooked up to protect privacy
“Betty, my patient is still sleeping in her room. Why don’t I take this gentleman off your hands?”, I asked.
Well, my hospice patient was sleeping. I was not sure what to do. I came down to the lobby level and saw Betty – at the front desk – struggling with all the calls to the front desk, buzzing visitors in and paying attention to the impatiently walking John (also a patient).
“Thank you”
“No problem”
The next 30 minutes was an eye opening exercise. Gave me a window into what my dad must have gone thru. And what I might too, myself.
You see, John has been suffering from a lot of old age issues. At a macro level, his kids have been great to him. They pay for the hospice facility, they visit him religiously every week and make a big deal on special days.
At a micro level, he has no idea about any of that. He needs them with him NOW!
The walk up and down the corridors was mostly pleas from him to see if I could get his kids to pick up from that place. (He thinks he lost his way and one of his kids just needs to take him home).
When somebody is totally daft, it is one thing. You just talk past each other. The only purpose is for the other person to think you are listening. They have no ability to judge otherwise. But when you swing between the real and unreal worlds like John, it becomes dangerous.
It is a delicate act of balancing between soothing him down when he is angry because he thinks I am not helping and supporting him when he thinks that his daughter is going to call him back moment she is done with work.
He had a mobile phone on him. That had a lot of saved numbers. And he fumbled his way to high heavens trying to call any of those numbers. All this time, walking up and down with me in the corridors.
“Why don’t we go out and sit?”
“Okay”
We settled down. But he was fixated on his phone.
Then I heard the “click” “click” noise!
“What did you do?”
“I think I took pictures.”
“Of what?”
“I have no idea”
Apparently, he was totally lost in the phone options.
“Listen, Mr. John. Why don’t you let me take a picture of you and me so I can show my daughter?”
“Is she in Stamford, Connecticut?”
“No. she is here, in Georgia”.
“This is not Georgia”
“You are right. I meant she is in Georgia. You and I are in Connecticut”. (I had to play along with his memory)
“Will you send it to my daughter?”
“Moment I meet her, sir!”
“Okay”
And of course, the instant I take the picture, he starts calling his daughter again!!
The evening went on like that…
Here is what I learnt that evening – When you grow old, you do not want anything more than being surrounded by your near and dear ones. You do realize that they have more important things to do in life. But you really, really want to be with them.
If you ever get a chance to make a difference to an old person by just being with them, please do. You do not have much time left. I know I do not!
The last time I met Kwok, we had remembered the times we had worked together back in the days. You might remember from the post then how I was absolutely taken in by this youngster’s willingness to learn new things and put in the hard work to do so.
That meeting was in 2017. I was visiting his town. Four years later, he was visiting mine. And we arranged to make sure we get some time for a drink and dinner.
This time our discussions were a little more esoteric than Unix scripts – Talent and Time. We had some good exchanges of experiences on the difficulties of nurturing and managing Talent. And also an in-depth discussion around whether Time is real or something we have made up to make sense of this universe.
Great time spent with this youngster.
As I lifted my eyes from the Zoom screen, I saw the young gentleman entering the shared office place I work from when in Atlanta. I recognized him immediately – but was on a call.
Once the call got over, I walked up to him and asked “Ben?”
“Yes, sir! I recognized you but was not sure what you were doing here”.
And that is how I ran into Ben Austin after a few years. Ben was part of Natasha’s close friends circle from middle school and they are still great friends. I remember him as the most level headed and responsible person in that group. Never shied from helping out his friends.
And he always called me “Papa Roy” !!
Ben also had great curiosity towards mixology. In fact, we reminisced about how, once he crossed 21, we had made an Old Fashioned together – with the cocktail smoker I had. He even remembered the wood chips we used that day!
Next time, I have an Old Fashioned – I will raise it to this young, aspiring medical professional!!
Reading my old blogs, I realized this morning that exactly ten years back, in 2011, on this day, I had written the following… (This was in Durgapur – even before they had moved to Kalyani)
“Well, that was my week with my parents. My best time each day was waking up at 4:30 to sit with my parents for a couple of hours in our garden. Drinking tea, watching the daybreak, enjoying the flowers, occasional question and answer but mostly quiet – just enjoying each other’s company. No doubt we were all wondering how many more such days we will have. The loudest conversations, indeed, were the silent ones.”
And today too, as on those days, my loudest conversations with them are the silent ones…
“Kelly?”, I asked the rather startled lady running around with drinks and food for everybody who had gathered around the big outside patio and bar area on the fifth floor of the JW Marriott in Marco Island.
“Yes?”, the lady replied in a muffled sort of way from behind the mask but clearly confused about why I was asking that question.
“You may not remember me. Let’s try this..”, I said, as I removed my mask.
“Oh! Raj! Westin!”
“Indeed”
You see, right behind my office in Itasca (suburban Chicago) is the Westin I often stay in. And Kelly used to work there before the pandemic hit. During pandemic, she found a job in the JW Marriott in Marco Island and moved there. And that is exactly where I was vacationing with Sharmila!
***
To be fair, this was not sheer luck. I could not have recognized Kelly with her mask on. There is a backstory to this.
Two weeks back, I was in the Westin hotel and sitting at the bar talking up Janice and Tom – the two folks who have helped me there for the last few years. Janice and I were catching up on our families when I mentioned that my wife and I had lined up a few vacations to make up for Covid time. She mentioned how she wanted to visit Florida and visit an old friend from Westin who has moved there.
“Who is it?”
“Remember Kelly?”
“Yes.”
“She has moved to Marco Island.”
“Really? I am going to be there in 2 weeks time with my wife. I have never been there.”
“You will love it. She works in the Marriott there. Beautiful property.”
“Wait a minute. Which Marriott?”
“JW”
“No way! That is where I will be staying. I will be sure to meet her!!”
***
Now roll forward a couple of weeks. I am back at the Itasca Westin after a day’s work. Dropped my suitcase and all that in the room and went straight to the bar to catch up on some dinner.
Janice saw me from a distance and waved at me.
“I have something for you!”
“I have a vague idea what it might be!”
And that is when she went inside and got my sunglasses out for me.
***
You are probably wondering what is the thread joining all this, right? Well, the day after I met Kelly was the day we were checking out. And I suddenly realized that I was missing my sunglasses. Went around the hotel and reported to the authorities to let me know if they ever find it.
And reluctantly drove back to the airport, all the time squinting in my left eye in the bright Florida sunlight.
Before jumping on to the plane, I left a note for Kelly that I was missing my sunglasses. I was not sure I would ever get it back. I left a voicemail at my eye-doctor’s too. Those were prescription glasses and I can’t simply just walk in and get myself a new one. Since I have very high numbers (negative 8.5), it takes time to make those glasses.
The flight from Fort Myers to Atlanta had no wifi connection.
“Que sera, sera”, I said to myself and just settled down.
By the time I got down in Atlanta, there was a message from Kelly. Which made it crystal clear to me what had happened to my sunglasses.
The previous evening, Sharmila and I were sitting at the bar and talking about the kids and her mom in India. Before signing off, I was trying to take a picture of us. I used the sunglass cover as a support for my iPhone while setting up for a time-delayed picture.
Eduardo – who was serving us – and in the previous days had given us a few tips on what to do when we visit his motherland Colombia had coming running around and offered to take the picture for us. Which he did.
And he handed my phone back to me. I admired the pictures he had taken (which is a difficult thing to do since my picture was also there). And completely forgot about the sunglasses which I had carefully positioned.
Eduardo realized my mistake later but was not aware that I was checking out the next day. He had kept it for safekeeping to give it back to me. Of course, I never showed up.
Kelly picked it up from him.
And this is where my lucky break comes. Kelly had mentioned that she would be back in Chicago to close out on selling their house and finish up her chapter there.
While there, she came by her old work place and handed my long lost sunglasses to Janice.
And that is how I was reunited with my sunglasses!!
***
“Janice, can I take a picture of you with the sunglasses? I want to show it to my wife and kids. They always make fun of me for making friends with strangers. I want them to know that I would not have found my sunglasses but for that!”
That was an interesting set of connections – involving two cities, two hotels, two bartenders, one set of sunglasses and one person never ceasing to be awed by the personal stories of people he chances upon!!
“You have to explain to me the ink”, I asked the young lady who brought our food out.
It was a glorious sunny day as John and I sat down in the patio of Sunset Grille on Lake Allatoona after riding our motorbikes there. We had placed our order and were catching up on our families when the aforementioned lady got us our lunch.
Which is when I noticed the tattoo on her right arm. Tattoos are great ice breakers for me. Almost everybody has a story behind every tattoo they have. Sometimes remembering somebody near and dear, sometimes a life philosophy and sometimes “just because”. It has always been a great story telling topic for me. In full disclosure, I have stories myself but no tattoo.
In any case, the lady started telling the story about how she and her dad has the same tattoo and then went into further describing how she got it. And at every step, my memory cells were getting excited. Because the story was sounding very similar to somebody else Sharmila and I had once met.
I had to stop her – “Wait a minute! Do you know Courtney?”
“Mr. Roy, I AM Courtney!!”
Holy cow! I had absolutely not recognized her!
The back story is the following – Last summer, during Covid times, Sharmila and I used to come regularly to this spot, grab some food and sit by the dock. We had befriended Courtney then who had waited upon us. I think we met her a couple of times when she let us know that she was moving to St. Simon’s to study there. We were, of course, excited that she was going to pursue higher studies. And somewhat sorry that we won’t meet a familiar face again.
Thru Facebook though, Courtney and I had kept in touch. In fact, that is how I had found out that she would be back in Atlanta for the summer and was going to work again in Sunset Grill before going back to St. Simon’s again.
When I had walked in, I had indeed asked the lady in the front if Courtney was around. She told us that Courtney would be coming in for the evening shift.
So, I was not expecting to see Courtney at all! Turns out, she was there. And she had recognized me. Even though it was not her table, she had brought out the food for us!!
Man, I am getting old! Cannot recognize faces!! But I am glad she had recognized me.
It was great to reconnect with Courtney. We even took a picture before we left.
Hope to go back there soon with Sharmila again.
